


What is it to Be a Parent?

by HouseElfMagic



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Found Family, Gen, I wrote this a long time ago, bellatrix as a mother, good!Bellatrix, well not evil bellatrix anyhow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-25
Updated: 2016-11-25
Packaged: 2018-09-02 00:47:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8644786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HouseElfMagic/pseuds/HouseElfMagic
Summary: What if Bellatrix wasn't evil? What if she saved Neville and Harry?





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a really long time ago, so forgive me that it's not... great. Not beta'd either. I just really want the bad guys to be good guys.

What if Bellatrix wasn't evil? What if she saved Neville and Harry?

 

If you’d asked Bellatrix Black two years ago where she hoped to be in life, she’d never have said she’d have kids. She’d never say that she’d ever be selfless. She most certainly would never say she’d be on the best possible path to the destruction of Lord Voldemort.

But hey, life happens.

So now all those things are true. Perhaps it would be better to start many years ago in the midst of a war.

 

“Kill the brat. I’ll get the muggle-loving _parents_.” Rudolphus spat. I stretched my lips into an evil smile and turned to the crying babe. He was only a year old, splotchy red face contorting as he cried at the strange new people, yelling more as screams were heard from upstairs. I’d never had much of a soft spot for infants, but... something about the child, suddenly within arms-length that caused curiosity to build within me; curiosity and something unnameable.

The kid wasn’t the one of the prophesy, given that the date was wrong. I’d be killed if I didn’t kill the child, but this child wouldn’t bring about the fall of my ‘Lord’ regardless of what happened in the future. I could keep the child close, teach him right from wrong, teach him all he’d need to know in life. It would never concern the Master.

The screams turned into unintelligible blubbering from upstairs and I knew I had little time.

I glanced at the child and ripped off my necklace with an emergency portkey to my home. I wrapped the chain around the child’s little hand and watched as the toddler disappeared. I immediately conjured a small golem to take the place of the child. I then cast a spell at the golem which began wailing as a few small cuts began appearing on its skin. Rudolphus came downstairs and stared at me with impatience.

“What are you doing? We need to leave.” I turned a wicked smile on my ex-fiancé.

“Playing with my food.” I called, cutting the child again on the shin. The wailing continued.

“Stop then. We mustn’t keep our Lord waiting.” I pouted, but sighed a moment afterwards. I cast a quick glance at the screaming baby then repeated the words of the killing curse.

“Avada Kedarva!” And Neville Frank Longbottom was no more.

 

I apparated back to my house- a Black Family manor just outside London- to find that the baby was being rocked by my house elf Jinx who looked flustered and bewildered. “Mistress! A baby just appeared ins the sittin’ room!” She flinched, expecting punishment, but received none. She used to be my sister’s elf.

“I brought the baby. Can you bring him to the Master bedroom while I take care of something?”

What on earth have I done? Rescuing the baby was one thing, but I don’t know how to raise a child! What do I feed him? Is he toilet trained? I will not change _nap pies!_ What have I gotten myself into?

Time to call for backup: my old nanny elf Bripsy.

Bripsy, patient as he was in old age, was helpful. Sadly, I had to burden him yet again. When I returned to Death Eater headquarters a few minutes later due to necessity, we were still awaiting news of our Lord. After an hour, Rebastan and Lucius left to go to the Potter residence. All they found instead was ruin. They clung to the shadows as Aurors went into the house and bodies were brought out, according to their stories. Lily and James Potter were killed obviously, but there was another body- a body that did not belong to a baby.

Our Master was dead.

Naturally, I should have been relieved. The pureblood message was bullshit, but a necessary evil to survive in the world Voldemort planned to bring; the Light wasn’t strong enough to defeat him, so it was self-preservation to choose the winning side. Instead, our Lord was dead and the Death Eaters continued.

This war wasn’t over; the Death Eaters were out for blood. I returned home and learned from Bripsy how on earth parenting worked (the baby was most certainly not toilet trained). Parenting wasn’t my forté. I can teach the child about magic, but I’d be hopeless trying to care for it. Him.

Dammit.

 

I’m not mother material. So why do I _keep getting into these situations?!_

First Neville- who I’d renamed Alexander because Neville or Frank would be too obvious a link to his parents. When he got his letter- would the kid still be mine then?- I couldn’t have the name say Neville. So I blood adopted the child, named him, and voila. Alexander Cartridge. Like his mother’s name Alice.

A few short months later, Lucius called me in to look for the Potter boy who’d disappeared. I had no doubt that the fool Dumbledore was responsible so I had a few ideas of where to look.

Cousin Sirius was in jail for killing the Potters and Pettigrew (since Pettigrew was missing), so he was ruled out. The Longbottoms were dead. Lupin was who knows where doing who knows what werewolf-y things, blah blah blah. McGonagall was too old to raise a child and Dumbledore- I don’t even want to imagine him parenting. That ruled out all the powerful members of the not-so-secret Order of the Phoenix and all the members that Dumbledore would trust with the child. So maybe the baby wasn’t with a magical family at all.

That muggle-loving old coot.

I immediately looked into the muggle newspapers from the past few months and found a record of a Harry James Potter being adopted by his deceased mother’s sister and her family. If the prophesy that I wasn’t supposed to know about was true, then this little brat was the possible key to ending the war, one way or another. I might as well look into it, even if I don’t report it.

I located the house of the kid’s aunt on a muggle invention called the Internet. I have to say, I may hold no lost love for muggles, but the internet is brilliant. It’s like a library where you can type a word into something called ‘Google’ and voila- information.

Anyway, it didn’t take but a moment to locate the house and commence spying. Spying is something that one has to learn, yet it is a skill I’ve perfected. Learning secrets is a favorite past time of mine.

I wasn’t expecting this secret though. Inside the house, some disgusting whale of a man was yelling at a small baby- probably Potter- while a baby whale cried in his high chair and a horse-faced long-necked stick of a woman looked on with a sneer as the man held a fat hand over the small child’s crying face, yelling at him to shut up.

Why don’t the neighbors call the muggle Aurors? (They have that, right? The polise or something?) And people wonder why I think humans are evil. Or maybe they just think I’m evil. I don’t really care.

At least even I know that hurting a baby is stupid. And evil. So _ha!_ The whale was probably going to suffocate the baby. I hesitated. What is this, good deed week? Fine. Karma.

I cast a silencio on the house and walked toward the front door under a Notice-Me-Not charm. The lock was easily disabled with a simple Alohamora. In moments, I was in the kitchen, before I decided to have some fun.

_Clang!_ A dish crashed to the floor across the room. Only the woman seemed to have noticed.

_Slap!_ The blinds closed simultaneously, hiding the kitchen from the outside world. The whale released the child, looking terrified before a murderous look crossed his face. I had no doubt he wished to kill the baby. I cast a stunner at the whale who fell to the floor unconscious and the woman finally screamed, grabbed the fat baby, and ran out the front door. There’s obviously no love in _that_ marriage.

I look back at the baby, only to be met with emerald eyes tinged with fear. How adorable; the child sees through low-powered notice-me-nots. I scoop up the baby and sit him on my hip, removing the spell as I did so. The baby reached for my hair and placed some in his mouth, fear seemingly gone. Babies really don’t understand that they should fear strangers. Who better to teach the child than I, now caring for Alexander too.

I think I’ll name him James.

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment!!!


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